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I have 2 old letters which i have partially scanned in. Both are very old and were written by a famous Victorian man. They are very hard to read and as you can see the writing styles were slightly different in those days so dont expect it to make sense.

A few of us put our heads together and wrote down what we thought but i could do with more input. If you want to help me out then click on each image and see if you can read them.

The first letter is from July 3rd 1893 and is proving the most difficult one out of the two.


The first line could be "You did not come across last night and *possible persons name* waited for you" or "You did not come ... last night and (missing "the" - maybe a mistake) meeting waited for you". Anyway we have a few ideas but this is what we think we have so far....

"You did not come ..... last night and meeting waited for you ..... ..... better now go ..... ..... aswell or the ..... and he will take you up and introduce you to him

I think he confirmed ..... job at 30/ a .....

Get out your averages ..... ..... and see him at once. You are playing at Perry Bar Saturday

Kick off is 2.15"



2nd letter is dated July 17th 1894



This is what we have for this letter...

"As this ..... cup tie has to be displayed ..... ..... the committee hope every man will keep himself for the occasion and them self as fresh as they were today which is a credit to themselves and the club committee want every man to turn up at the club house Monday morning 10.00"

I can explain what all these letters are about at a later date

Any help or input would be appreciated

"As this great cup tie has to be displayed next wednesday the committee hope every man will keep himself for the occasion and them self as fresh as they were today which is a credit to themselves and the club committee want every man to turn up at the club house Monday morning 10.00"

my guess on the second one.

excellent - thanks . I think you are correct!

Now the only part of that letter that we need confirming is actually the date. Some say July and some say May...Here is the date scanned in.

Loopz wrote:excellent - thanks . I think you are correct!

Now the only part of that letter that we need confirming is actually the date. Some say July and some say May...Here is the date scanned in.

I'd go for July 17th

definitely july.
for the top one, i reckon
"you did not come across [looks like it has 2 c's, tho the second might be blocked out?] last night and meeting waited for you.
well you better now go + see Mr Russel or Mr Johnston and he will take you up and introduce you to him.
i think he confirmed your job at 30/ a track[?]
get out your averages + all particulars and see him at once."
and you had the rest.

second one i'd change "displayed" to "replayed", and "them self" to "turn out", rest looks all good

my nan's writing style was very similar, which probably helps... altho i usually had to get my mum to help with a few of her words, & sometimes we couldn't figure them out and had to ask her when we saw her

Couple of things on the first letter -

It could be Mr Ansell instead of Mr Russell.

The reference to money is probably 30 shillings a week (I think the symbol for shillings and no pence was ' /- ').

Timbob wrote:"As this great cup tie has to be displayed next wednesday the committee hope every man will keep himself for the occasion and them self as fresh as they were today which is a credit to themselves and the club committee want every man to turn up at the club house Monday morning 10.00"

my guess on the second one.

I reckon "...himself for the occasion and them self as fresh as..."

is actually:

"...himself for the occasion and turn out as fresh as...".

Loopz - it's obviously footy related (or is it?), so would be interested to know the background.

yeah could be right about mr ansell. looking again i can only see one s anyway.
and yeah i figured the / would be shillings or some other money unit, but decided to leave that to those with more knowledge and experience of ye olde days

hippy dave wrote: i figured the / would be shillings or some other money unit, but decided to leave that to those with more knowledge and experience of ye olde days

Bloody decimilisation. Kids these days can't even do base 12 arithmetic...

It's in code - you have to read it backwards.

It says:

Kill deadly doug for he is satan. Tubbs must die for he is the devils spawn. Make sacrifice at once to relegate the blue scum. Red Rum Red Rum

I have no idea what it means...

Acid Gaz wrote:Kids these days can't even do base 12 arithmetic...

well i can, but that's only because i have two extra toes on my left foot.

dave - i think you have cracked the first mystery! It has to be Mr Johnson as i know this person also exists. Not sure about Russell or Ansell though. I will list the names of the people that it could be from some other information i have and you can tell me if any of these could be legit.

Lees, Grierson, Cooper, Margoschis, McGregor, Rinder, Dunkley and Johnson. I doubt it will be Grierson as he was a trainer but then again Mr Johnson was a linesman. McGregor is the big man and those who know their football history will know what he is responsible for and Dunkley was the treasurer.

the 30/ is 30 shillings and i think the word is "week" at the end.


So we now have

"You did not come across last night and meeting waited for you. Well you better now go see Mr Rusell Mr Ansell or Mr Johnson and he will take you up and introduce you to him

I think he confirmed your job at 30/ a week

Get out your averages + (or and) your particulars and see him at once. You are playing at Perry Bar Saturday

Kick off is 2.15"



2nd one

The date could be July but i have to check a few things out as to why they are refering to a cup tie in July as cup ties were played in the first 3 months of the year. It could be an alternative cup tie (ie: not the F.A.Cup).

"As this great cup tie has to be replayed next wednesday the committee hope every man will keep himself for the occasion and turn out as fresh as they were today which is a credit to themselves and the club committee want every man to turn up at the club house Monday morning 10.00"

Acid Gaz – I will fill you all in on this very soon. Its quite interesting in a weird geeky kind of way

good stuff. i don't think the name can be any of those that you mentioned, i'm sure it ends in "sell" - there's not much else those letters could be. it's either an n or a u before that, and guessing at the first letter, i'm gonna stick with "ansell". wouldn't say i'm certain about that, but i do feel pretty sure it's another person on top of the ones you already knew about - sorry

if only i gave a crap about football history i'm sure i'd find this very intriguing

yeah i think you are right.

I've been looking at this website for examples of victorian writing.

Examples of letters

Examples

I haven't looked at the letters but my eyes are crap anyway

Hmm, it's all very interesting Poo, I take it this is the man you told me about